At the end of the track, the black and white checkered flag whirled.
The match was coming to an end.
Speeding around the last corner, the one in the lead was still the rare Asian driver in the international Formula One races, Ye Ci.
He performed as always in this race, his style aggressive and almost crazy.
More than one sports commentator had spoken negatively about his extreme style of play.
Some thought that this so-called rising star possessed very composed suicidal tendencies, and one bluntly stated that he didn’t seem to really love the sport, that the track probably brought him more than just accolades, and was more of an outlet for his violent emotions. There were also small online media outlets that vaguely suggested that Ye Ci was suspected of suffering from some kind of mental illness. Coupled with his rare Asian identity and Omega gender in this event, and his inhuman arrogance in media interviews . . .
In the stands, cheers and boos mingled together.
He had a mixed reputation.
But all of this had no effect on Ye Ci.
The car he drove was matte black, the entire body made of carbon fiber material edged in pale, dancing gold, like roaring black dysprosium [1] entwined with golden thread. Unstoppable, it roared past the finish line.
In the VIP stands, a handsome man with a proud smile gave a standing ovation despite the boos all around him.
In the lounge:
Ye Ci walked with an unsteady gait, staggered, and fell onto the sofa. His water-drenched hair had been pushed back, exposing a warm face that was as pink as a spring peach.
For an Omega, a formula race was enough to completely exhaust his physical strength.
He couldn’t even strip off his racing suit.
This was Ye Ci’s exclusive lounge. Huo Tinglan closed the door and locked it, and unscrewed the cap of an energy drink. The light blue plastic bottle touched Ye Ci’s soft, wet red lips as the drink was fed to him.
Ye Ci was quiet and obedient, raising his hand to support Huo Tinglan’s wrist as he emptied the bottle in this position. A pair of eyes narrowed, their emotions inscrutable. They were a pale color, like a distant, mist-shrouded mountain.
Having been married to Huo Tinglan for five years, he had always been like this.
Cool, restrained, quiet.
Huo Tinglan knew that Ye Ci was just not good at expressing his feelings, and also knew the cause of his withdrawn and introverted character. He felt sorry for him, and pitied him even more. In his eyes, Ye Ci was like a porcelain beauty restored from fragments, seemingly rigid, but in fact scarred, fragile and brittle. After five years of marriage, during which he treated Ye Ci with great care and love in every possible way, the results were unfortunately poor. The only things that could make Ye Ci feel a bit of relief were racing sports like Formula One. Perhaps only through the life-or-death stimulation of extreme speed could he feel the beating of his heart and the vitality still present in his body.
The air was full of sweet vanilla-scented pheromones mixed with sweat from the soaked one-piece racing suit, drifting freely.
This competition was coming to an end. In order not to waste Ye Ci’s physical strength, Huo Tinglan had been abstinent for many days. An Alpha in the prime of his life, like a hungry wolf or a fierce tiger, soaked in his partner’s 100% compatible Omega pheromones, he could only smother the fire and ask a gentle question: “Take it easy now?”
Ye Ci nodded and said nothing.
In order to not stimulate Ye Ci too much, Huo Tinglan had to suppress various “bad” elements of his Alpha nature to cooperate with Ye Ci, and didn’t dare to be too shameless in front of him. One quiet and restrained, one tender and gentlemanly, they had respected each other for five years. There had never been any discord, and although the model of their marriage was a bit dull, it was at least harmonious.
He couldn’t ask for more.
Huo Tinglan threw away the bottle and got close, pressing Ye Ci against the back of the sofa as he wrapped him in his arms. He stared at him for a moment with fiery eyes and said hoarsely: “You have a fever . . . have you used an inhibitor lately?”
Ye Ci shook his head, then raised his face and looked at him gently and obediently.
After years of tacit understanding, Huo Tinglan understood that this was Ye Ci’s way of saying that he could mark him completely.
For Ye Ci, this could be regarded as a very warm invitation.
Huo Tinglan lowered his head and used his thin lips to run over the two wet red patches, still holding back his urges, pressing down lightly, teasing patiently.
Ye Ci opened his eyes, and they were like a pair of polished glass orbs, a bit cool. His emotions were not apparent at first glance, but if you looked closely, it was clear that he was gradually softening.
“Tinglan . . .”
He called softly.
He couldn’t show too much emotion, so he had to pinch Huo Tinglan’s diamond cufflinks with two fingers, childishly clinging. He didn’t let him go, didn’t let him move away, until his fingertips turned red.
“Tinglan . . .”
He called again.
The two were obviously close, but his voice seemed inexplicably distant, as if he was asking Huo Tinglan for help through a thick and invisible barrier.
Huo Tinglan hugged him tighter, running his fingertips across his sweaty forehead, whispering comfort, trying to answer his cry for help.
Holding tight, and a little tighter.
It was like trying in vain to grip a slippery fish.
But eventually, it would dive down into the deep sea.
. . . . . .
Three months later, Ye Ci, at the age of 27, was accidentally killed in a race.
After his death, the outside world was divided.
There were unreliable and outrageous rumors about it, doing their best to attract people’s attention.
Slightly more reliable ones said that he was disturbed by depression and other mental problems, resulting in serious mistakes during the race.
There were also the good people who had unearthed the unfortunate early years of this rising star racing driver, with polarized reviews –
Abandoned by his wealthy biological father at a young age, and living in a slum with his mother . . . .
Abused and beaten by his stepfather, resulting in a speech impediment . . . .
When he became an adult, he was recognized by a wealthy family and became a tool for his biological father to compete for inheritance, and was treated unfairly . . . .
He dropped out of school to work due to his mother’s illness, which led to his failure of the college entrance examination . . . .
But his mother’s condition deteriorated and she died . . . .
. . . . . .
Before taking refuge with Huo Tinglan, he experienced too many dark and painful moments.
Perhaps, his spirit had already been burned to the ground.
No matter how gentle and lingering spring rain was, it was difficult to moisten scorched earth.
These rumors about Ye Ci’s tragic early life disappeared quite quickly.
Before being completely defeated by the heavy fist of reality, Ye Ci was strong and did not want to be pitied by others. Huo Tinglan didn’t want his scars to be what others talked about after dinner. The various spectator posts often survived for only a few minutes, but it was difficult to stop the small-scale spread of gossip. There had always been no shortage of gossip lovers in the news comment threads related to Ye Ci.
Below a certain obituary that had been forwarded more than 100,000 times, among the mourning voices of many fans, there was a slightly “pretentious” hot comment –
“It’s hard to imagine how much pain Huo Tinglan must be in. He has lost his little husband forever.”
A passerby asked curiously about the relationship between Huo Tinglan and Ye Ci, and some people started gossiping in the thread.
“They had been married for five years. When Ye Ci was only twenty-two years old, Huo Tinglan happened to see him compete once, and it should be considered love at first sight. It is said that he chased after him for half a year. Huo Tinglan was twelve years older than him, so he always called him Little Sir, and after marriage, the two of them were still very polite to each other. There was mutual respect between them. Ye Ci himself was a bit introverted, but this pair was still very sweet, it’s a pity . . .”
“Huo is an A+ grade Alpha, and his compatibility with Omegas is generally low. He will never meet another Omega that is 100% compatible with him in this life.”
“What if there’s a second one . . . . the one who knows the whole story showed that Huo Tinglan is really affectionate. If even he can marry another one with ease, that Alpha isn’t a good person anymore.”
This topic was brought up, and the comment area gradually started to chat about it.
An hour later, a new comment was bumped to the top.
“If time could be reversed, if Huo Tinglan could have met his little gentleman earlier, protected him earlier, would everything be different?”
The crowd below echoed this.
. . . . . .
When Huo Tinglan woke up, the sky was bright.
His cell phone alarm clock was going off.
It was 6:00 a.m.
Huo Tinglan turned off the alarm clock and closed his eyes again. Reaching out a hand with bulging blue veins, he groped to the side, looking for the half-full bottle of tequila.
Ye Ci was gone.
It hurt so much.
There was a hole in the softest part of his heart.
His nerves longed to be drenched in potent alcohol, and the more sluggish the soaking made him, the better.
However, he failed to touch the cool, delicate and hard bottleneck in his imagination. Instead, he encountered a smooth LCD screen. The touch was almost unfamiliar.
“. . . . . .”
Huo Tinglan frowned and slowly opened his eyes.
What came into view was a laptop computer with a brightly lit screen on a dark black background. It was lined with a variety of ECG-like steep lines and dense numbers – the interface of a financial software that he was very familiar with . . .
And he himself was actually lying on a desk as faint golden light shone in from the blinds.
It was as if he accidentally fell asleep while staying up late last night to handle official business.
Was it possible?
He had no mind to work.
But how could he be at the company . . .
Did he sleepwalk?
It was too comical.
Huo Tinglan propped up his upper body and grinned in pain.
However, this mocking smile suddenly froze before it could be restrained.
The chaos between dreams and wakefulness faded, and for a moment, he was suddenly sober.
This place . . . was clearly his office ten years ago.
The body preceded the mind. With just one glance, Huo Tinglan precisely swept to the lower right corner of the computer screen. His subconscious had sensed something, and his black pupils were extremely bright.
Saturday, 6:02.
2021/ … …
Huo Tinglan tried his best to hold his breath and unlocked the phone with his fingerprint. The phone still displayed that date.
When he opened the address book, his hands were shaking so much that he could barely hold the phone.
According to memory, he called the personal assistant he’d had back then.
At 6:30 in the morning, the opposite side picked up in three seconds.
Such was the style of the personal assistant, a hard-working, always-on-call Beta.
“Mr. Huo.”
This voice was also familiar.
Huo Tinglan gripped the phone without saying a word, and walked to the floor-to-ceiling window. The glass in the early morning was shrouded in a hazy light, reflecting his face.
Handsome, with sharp features and dark eyes that revealed a rare look of surprise, and . . . he was still young.
This was what he looked like when he was thirty.
This was ten years ago.
Suddenly:
His heart beat wildly, his blood boiled, and the bridge of his nose was sore and painful.
This year, Ye Ci was only eighteen years old.
Everything was within reach.
. . . . . .
At two o’clock in the afternoon, the Fengchi Circuit on the outskirts of the city was bustling with activity.
On the side of the track, a heavy duty motorcycle was parked under the spotlights.
The metal fittings on its body had heated up in the race just moments earlier, scorching hot under the blazing white afternoon sun.
Beside the motorcycle, a long leg rested on the ground. The rider was a teenager who looked like a high school student.
He was wearing a dark sweater with a slightly childish hood design, with a few strands of soft black hair spilling out from under the brim of the hood. It was neatly placed across his brow, out of tune with the curiously dressed drag racing teams around.
Ye Ci, just after his eighteenth birthday, had dropped out of school for more than a year. He was currently repeating his second year of high school in Tiancheng Private School. His structural gender was male, his glandular gender . . . the record on his household registration card had been changed to Omega a few days ago.
He held a stack of banknotes, counted them, and put them in his pocket.
. . . Still a long way to go.
Ye Ci looked at the track. His pale pupils and skin were cold like thin porcelain, hard and brittle.
Fengchi Circuit had been operating in the suburbs for many years, providing tracks and a variety of vehicle rentals – motorcycles, Formula One, they could all be used. The track was legally operated, but most of the people who came to race were not good people. Drag racing burned money – the track, the car, the fuel, real money everywhere. So the custom of racing for money gradually emerged amongst this subset of people who often came to compete. At the beginning, it was only small amounts, purely to subsidize track fees and fuel expenses. Later, this group of people got used to playing with money, and the amount also rose. Sometimes a win or a loss could mean tens of thousands of dollars, and if you lost a few big races in a row, you may even have to relinquish your vehicle to others.
“Want to race?” A blonde-haired man riding a Harley slid toward Ye Ci, covered all over in ear and lips studs, along with iron chains that might weigh several kilograms when removed.
Huang Mao was a frequent visitor to the racetrack. His skills weren’t bad and he was good at tricks, and he’d earned the Harley under his ass through racing.
Ye Ci didn’t recall such a person, so he simply said, “Okay.”
“How old are you?” Huang Mao licked his lips.
Ye Ci adjusted his helmet and bit into the milk-flavored candy in his mouth: “It doesn’t matter either way.”
Huang Mao smiled. His slender legs on the ground swayed as if he had ADHD, and he looked at Ye Ci’s clothes, offering a price that was not excessive: “Three thousand, dare to play?”
Ye Ci lowered his eyes: “Dare.”
He cherished words like gold.
The two motorcycles slid to the start of the track.
Huang Mao squinted at Ye Ci. His gaze turned sly and landed on Ye Ci’s feet.
Off-brand sneakers, cheap and worn out but clean, maybe bleached, pure white.
Huang Mao grinned happily inside his helmet – everyone said that this was the new and amazing driver who had showed up to play this month, a crazy and fierce whirlwind. But wasn’t this actually a child?
Engines roared, and the two heavy-duty motorcycles rushed past the starting line.
The Harley’s momentum was fierce, with a high-horsepower starting speed, exerting enough energy to make Ye Ci take note of the initial show of strength. But Ye Ci hit the gas more ruthlessly. Even if his hardware was no match for it, he still ate up the distance. The battle between the two vehicles was at a stalemate until they reached the middle of the track. Ye Ci precisely caught the multiple low pressure areas behind the vehicle in front, and the hardcore-style Kawasaki motorcycle roared as it brushed past Huang Mao.
“**** your mother!” Huang Mao couldn’t afford to lose and revealed his fierceness. “Little bastard!”
He had originally wanted to bully the child and crush him, but unexpectedly, the little wolf dog was chasing and beating him.
Ye Ci turned a deaf ear and took the third corner at high speed, the distance between them getting wider and wider.
Three thousand yuan was about to fly, and he was still watching the little brat thrash him! The veins on the back of Huang Mao’s hands bulged, and he fought hard to accelerate around the corners.
The two motorcycles kept pace with each other, and the horizontal distance between them did not exceed one meter. Huang Mao took the opportunity to release the handlebar with one hand, and unexpectedly squeezed Ye Ci’s handlebar hard. . .
Forcing the opponent to brake in the middle of a race was not just a trick, it would not be an exaggeration to say that it was intentional injury.
The body of the motorcycle vibrated violently, jolting and fishtailing. Ye Ci tried his best to stabilize, kept silent, and then chased after him fiercely. The distance lost was tied again momentarily. Huang Mao didn’t get another chance to grab him again. He was utterly dismayed, even belting out curses.
A few minutes later, the two vehicles crossed the finish line, and Ye Ci was about to dismount.
Huang Mao slid off the track, swaying his legs and playing the rogue: “Yo, a tie?”
Ye Ci took off his helmet and glanced at him.
“Fuck.” Huang Mao clenched his jaw and gave him a ferocious look. “What’s with that expression?”
Before he finished speaking, a helmet flew over from a distance and smashed his mouth bloody. Huang Mao was about to attack, but took a foot to the shoulder and rolled to the ground. He suffered a few violent kicks immediately after, and the pain made him unable to straighten his back.
Ye Ci picked up the helmet, looking down at his left hand that had held the brake, and asked, “Owe a hand?”
Huang Mo sprayed blood: “I **** your mother . . . ah ah ah ah ah!”
The second half of his curses were swallowed back –
Ye Ci stomped on his left hand.
A lot of people gathered around to watch the fun, but no one approached to fight.
Ye Ci’s appearance gave off a youthfulness that could not be concealed, but his aura was terrifyingly violent.
He resembled a glass knife, fragile but sharp.
Huang Mao was in pain and fear, but the few blows just now were enough for him to assess Ye Ci’s strength – He was 80% sure he was an Alpha. He didn’t dare to say a word and hissed, shrinking into the wall with red eyes.
Ye Ci squatted down and gingerly pinched the hem of the yellow sweater with his fingernails, raising it to inspect Huang Mao’s upper body with an indifferent gaze.
“What, what are you doing?” Huang Mao hurriedly pulled the hem of his clothes down.
Soft tissue contusion with an area of less than 15 square centimeters, oral cavity damage, broken finger. . . Minor injuries, nothing serious.
He knew exactly what he was doing.
Ye Ci stared at him, took out his cell phone, and seemed to be warmhearted, but his tone revealed a threat: “Call the police?”
A wise man knew better than to fight when the odds were against him. Huang Mao shook his head: “Brother, I won’t report it, I really won’t report it.”
Ye Ci nodded, got up, and said in a clear voice, “That three thousand . . .”
“Yes, yes, 3,000, this is for you.” Huang Mao took out his phone.
Ye Ci shook his head, held his breath unnaturally for a few seconds, and then said slowly “. . . is for medical expenses.”
[1] A rare-earth element with a metallic silver luster. ⮐
Translator’s Note: I never would have thought when I first got into danmei that my first translation would be a modern-day A/B/O, but ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
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Table of Contents >> Chapter Two
Neon Dragonfly Translations 